Doing a practice exam for CCENT

Hi, I bought the ciscopress Odom book and it came with a CD that installs a Boson exam. I've been doing that exam and have some general questions first.

G1 How was the English on the real exam, because I find that just a few questions are badly formulated in the practice exam. Maybe it was just me. Also, the exam has 161 questions. If I can do 50 random questions in a 90 min period, am I good on speed?

G2 How many simulation questions did you get in the real thing? Two out of 50 or 40? More? Speaking of simulations, in the practice exam, once I clicked on a computer/router/switch to get into the IOS/DOS prompt, I couldn't get out of it and had to relaunch the simulator. It was annoying. I hope there isn't this kind of problem in the real exam.

G3 Will there be questions on VLSM for CCENT? I thought that was a ICND2 topic but the practice exam gave me at least 3 questions on it and I though they were pretty deep since I only know some limited concepts about it.

Now, I have more specific questions on the material.

Q1 If a hub is between 2 switches and no other device plugs in the hub, can the switches communicate in full duplex. The answer is no, but I answered yes because I reasoned that hubs are L1 devices and only regenerate electric signals, so it seems like full duplex would work here. Anyway, my question is, would full duplex work if the hub is a repeater. What about if it is a bridge? The answer seems to be yes in both cases.

Q2 About the TCP protocol, if 3 segments sent from host A to host B have sequence numbers 1600, 2100 and 2600, what would the acknowledgement field be? The answer is greater than 2600, which I did choose, but I also chose exactly 3100 which is wrong. Why not? The numbers seem to imply that 500 bytes are sent with each packets, so why can't we know for sure than the next packet asked would be 3100?

Q3 When we do a tracert command in IOS and everything replies from the destination and everything in between, why would there be ICMP time exceeded messages from the routers in between? I think I missed this completely when I read the book, so I'm going to look for it, but in case I can't find it, an answer would be great.

Q4 The question says someone tries to get into a switch using telnet, but "the Telnet connection fails, with a message stating something about missing passwords." The question wants me check the commands required to create a password and allow people to log in. Sound simple enough right? I checked the choices "line vty 0 4" and "password whatever" which were the right answers. I did not check "login" because 1) it is there by default and 2) if a "no login" command was issued, there wouldn't be a message about missing passwords in the first place. Sure there is no harm in putting it in, but correct me if I'm wrong, but I should get it right with only two commands. I remember been so angry when I saw the answers. Please tell me there aren't those kind of ambiguous questions in the real exam.

Edit: For Q4, I just realized that there could be a "login local" command issued. Actually, what would the message be if there was a login local command with no username command? I'll have to get that once I get on my router at home. Looks like I got angry for nothing and that question got me fair and square.

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Comments

mikej412

feng.lian wrote: »

How many simulation questions did you get in the real thing?

Cisco doesn't publish that information and discussion of that would violate the Cisco Non-Disclosure Agreement.

bermovick

feng.lian wrote: »

Hi, I bought the ciscopress Odom book and it came with a CD that installs a Boson exam. I've been doing that exam and have some general questions first.

G1 How was the English on the real exam, because I find that just a few questions are badly formulated in the practice exam. Maybe it was just me. Also, the exam has 161 questions. If I can do 50 random questions in a 90 min period, am I good on speed?

That's pretty much what I did to give myself a bit of a 'time crunch' simulating the real exam. I usually finished the boson exams with around 30 minutes remaining and I finished the actual exam with 10-20 minutes remaining. You'll get different questions, but it seemed a reasonable practice.

G2 How many simulation questions did you get in the real thing? Two out of 50 or 40? More? Speaking of simulations, in the practice exam, once I clicked on a computer/router/switch to get into the IOS/DOS prompt, I couldn't get out of it and had to relaunch the simulator. It was annoying. I hope there isn't this kind of problem in the real exam.

As Mike said, we can't give this information out. Plus I've heard the exam changes each week (from the pool of questions available), so any answer you might get wouldn't really be accurate.

G3 Will there be questions on VLSM for CCENT? I thought that was a ICND2 topic but the practice exam gave me at least 3 questions on it and I though they were pretty deep since I only know some limited concepts about it.

Yeah, that's what I thought, and if you look in the boson environment, you'll see those questions are even listed as ICND2. No idea why Boson includes them in ICND1 exam.

Now, I have more specific questions on the material.

Q1 If a hub is between 2 switches and no other device plugs in the hub, can the switches communicate in full duplex. The answer is no, but I answered yes because I reasoned that hubs are L1 devices and only regenerate electric signals, so it seems like full duplex would work here. Anyway, my question is, would full duplex work if the hub is a repeater. What about if it is a bridge? The answer seems to be yes in both cases.

No, it wouldn't be able to operate full duplex with a hub, because like you said the hub just operates as a repeater. If switch 1 detects the line is clean and sends a signal, while switch 2 detects the line is clean and also sends a signal, the hub will just repeat those 2, causing a collision. A bridge breaks collision domains, so that should be ok with full duplex.

Q2 About the TCP protocol, if 3 segments sent from host A to host B have sequence numbers 1600, 2100 and 2600, what would the acknowledgement field be? The answer is greater than 2600, which I did choose, but I also chose exactly 3100 which is wrong. Why not? The numbers seem to imply that 500 bytes are sent with each packets, so why can't we know for sure than the next packet asked would be 3100?

I remember that question and got it wrong also, selecting the same answers. I even asked about it here! The answer I got was that you really can't be certain how large the next window will be, other than it being larger than 2600. (Although the book always increased them by the same interval in it's examples, which gives you that impression).

Q3 When we do a tracert command in IOS and everything replies from the destination and everything in between, why would there be ICMP time exceeded messages from the routers in between? I think I missed this completely when I read the book, so I'm going to look for it, but in case I can't find it, an answer would be great.

I'm also pretty sure this is ICND2, not ICND1 material, but tracert works by sending Time-to-Live pings to each router along it's path, starting with TTL 1. When each router gets the the packet it decreases the TTL by 1 and if it's 0, send a time exceeded packet back to the original device, which then sends a new ping with 1 higher TTL (causing the next router along the path to it's destination to send the time exceeded back). This way the sending device gets a packet back from each router along the path, until the TTL is high enough that the ping reaches it's destination.

Q4 The question says someone tries to get into a switch using telnet, but "the Telnet connection fails, with a message stating something about missing passwords." The question wants me check the commands required to create a password and allow people to log in. Sound simple enough right? I checked the choices "line vty 0 4" and "password whatever" which were the right answers. I did not check "login" because 1) it is there by default and 2) if a "no login" command was issued, there wouldn't be a message about missing passwords in the first place. Sure there is no harm in putting it in, but correct me if I'm wrong, but I should get it right with only two commands. I remember been so angry when I saw the answers. Please tell me there aren't those kind of ambiguous questions in the real exam.

Nope, I found the actual exam questions to be a bit harder, but much less tricky.

Edit: For Q4, I just realized that there could be a "login local" command issued. Actually, what would the message be if there was a login local command with no username command? I'll have to get that once I get on my router at home. Looks like I got angry for nothing and that question got me fair and square.

Good question. I'm not sure on this one & will have to try it myself too!

[EDIT]: screwed up my Quote's & /Quote's

feng.lian

bermovick wrote: »

As Mike said, we can't give this information out. Plus I've heard the exam changes each week (from the pool of questions available), so any answer you might get wouldn't really be accurate.

Oh, sorry, didn't know. I suppose it's one of the thing I'll have to sign on when I take the test.

bermovick wrote: »

Yeah, that's what I thought, and if you look in the boson environment, you'll see those questions are even listed as ICND2. No idea why Boson includes them in ICND1 exam.

Okay, I can safely not worry about it then.

bermovick wrote: »

No, it wouldn't be able to operate full duplex with a hub, because like you said the hub just operates as a repeater. If switch 1 detects the line is clean and sends a signal, while switch 2 detects the line is clean and also sends a signal, the hub will just repeat those 2, causing a collision. A bridge breaks collision domains, so that should be ok with full duplex.

When I think of a repeater (by extension, a hub with only 2 devices), I thought it would act just like a normal cable that can somehow transfer signals for a longer distance. I guess they are more complicated than that.

bermovick wrote: »

I remember that question and got it wrong also, selecting the same answers. I even asked about it here! The answer I got was that you really can't be certain how large the next window will be, other than it being larger than 2600. (Although the book always increased them by the same interval in it's examples, which gives you that impression).

Then I must not understand how windowing works. I thought it would work like this:

Host A sends 1 packet with sequence 100.
Host B sends ack 200.
Host A sends 2 packets with sequences 200 and 300.
Host B sends ack 400.
Host A sends 4 packets with sequences 400, 500, 600 and 700.
Host B's max is 3, so it drops one and sends ack 700.
Host A sends 3 packets with sequences 700, 800 and 900, with 700 being resent.
Host B sends ack 1000

My point is, it is host A that decides how much to send based on how many packets have been dropped. All host B is doing is sending ack of the packet that it wants. Host A receives that ack back and sends the requested packet, but also sends more packets according to the window size.

Edit: Also, the other point is that I though the ack number is ALWAYS predicable if we are sure that packets have not been dropped. This is because packet size does not vary. E.g. the last host B ack would not be 1100 instead of 1000 because host B would suddenly expect a 200 bytes packet instead of 100.

bermovick wrote: »

Nope, I found the actual exam questions to be a bit harder, but much less tricky.

Harder? Well, I suppose if all material asked are in ICND1 and there is no trick question, it should be fine. I'm just afraid they'd put something that is not on the curriculum or something ambiguous. Thanks for answering

bermovick

Yeah; I found the questions HARDER, although I scored like 920? on the exam, so I guess I was either a good guesser, or ... something.

About the window size; this is one of the things where the boson exams are being tricksy. Your edit used the word 'if', which is where boson catches you sometimes, since you can't assume no packets were dropped this time. To give an idea of the difference between boson and the regular exam, I found the actual exam, if it would have had this question (I'm not saying it did or didn't, or anything NDA-violating!), it would actually say something like "assuming no packets were dropped".

(If my understanding is correct. I could still be wrong; I never completely understood the answers I'd gotten when I asked the same question here)

feng.lian

Oh, one quick questions, did you memorize stuff like T3 is 44.736Mbps and E3 is 34.064Mbps and a class A network has that amount of of addresses. Since you got a pretty high mark, I'd assume that if you didn't, I wouldn't need to neither.

bermovick

I think giving an answer to that is getting close (or past) that NDA-line. I can say though that I'm HORRIBLE at memorizing things I can't apply.

feng.lian

By the way, I did no username. The login stayed the same, asking for a username, but of course, nothing would be let in since there was no user. I had login local both on vty and console. I almost locked myself out and started to freak out (password recovery is a hassle) until I remembered I didn't save the config.

joe48184

I noticed while browsing Boson's website for CCNA:S material, a small article / paragraph stating that the test questions that come with the Cisco press books are not written by Boson. When I downloaded the trial version of the 640-553 material the same statment poped up again. My guess is that when you buy the boson exam that you get the questions written by them.

feng.lian

Another quick question. Isn't CHAP authentication a ICND2 topic? I don't think the Odom book ICND1 explained it at all.

Edit: Another quick questions

9. Which is true as related to the Wi-Fi Alliance organization?
1 It is a global standards organization that controls the compatibility of Wi-Fi products
2 It operates only in the United States of America and ensures the compatibility of Wi-Fi products
3 It is a global, nonprofit industry trade association devoted to promoting the growth and acceptance of wireless LANs
4 It is a global, nonprofit industry trade association devoted to promoting the installation of wireless LANs in retail locations

From what I read in the Odom book, it looks like 1, but Cisco website says 3.

feng.lian

P.S.

Another quick question. I'm not sure if that violates the NDA, but will there be questions of this type?

32. To see how many bits you should borrow from the host portion of the network address to give you the number of subnets you need, you should _____.
subtract the number of subnets you need from the host portion
add the bit values from right to left until the total (decimal value) is just greater than the number of subnets you need
add the bit values from left to right until the total (decimal value) is just greater than the number of subnets you need
none of the above

It seems to me that this is just stupid. I know exactly how to create subnets based on how many subnets I need. They should ask us to simply create those subnets instead of trying to trip us on those super unclear and annoying choices.

joe48184

feng.lian wrote: »

Another quick question. Isn't CHAP authentication a ICND2 topic? I don't think the Odom book ICND1 explained it at all.

Edit: Another quick questions

9. Which is true as related to the Wi-Fi Alliance organization?
1 It is a global standards organization that controls the compatibility of Wi-Fi products
2 It operates only in the United States of America and ensures the compatibility of Wi-Fi products
3 It is a global, nonprofit industry trade association devoted to promoting the growth and acceptance of wireless LANs
4 It is a global, nonprofit industry trade association devoted to promoting the installation of wireless LANs in retail locations

From what I read in the Odom book, it looks like 1, but Cisco website says 3.

The Cisco press books and the Books I read for the Security+ course both indicate #3 is the correct answer.

joe48184

feng.lian wrote: »

P.S.

Another quick question. I'm not sure if that violates the NDA, but will there be questions of this type?

32. To see how many bits you should borrow from the host portion of the network address to give you the number of subnets you need, you should _____.
subtract the number of subnets you need from the host portion
add the bit values from right to left until the total (decimal value) is just greater than the number of subnets you need
add the bit values from left to right until the total (decimal value) is just greater than the number of subnets you need
none of the above

It seems to me that this is just stupid. I know exactly how to create subnets based on how many subnets I need. They should ask us to simply create those subnets instead of trying to trip us on those super unclear and annoying choices.

The best answers I can give you are: Be very comfortable with subnetting and know your material cover to cover. Questions are often asked in an indirect fashion to make sure you understand the process. Hang in there, the aggrivation is worth it.

Jackace

feng.lian wrote: »

P.S.

Another quick question. I'm not sure if that violates the NDA, but will there be questions of this type?

32. To see how many bits you should borrow from the host portion of the network address to give you the number of subnets you need, you should _____.
subtract the number of subnets you need from the host portion
add the bit values from right to left until the total (decimal value) is just greater than the number of subnets you need
add the bit values from left to right until the total (decimal value) is just greater than the number of subnets you need
none of the above

It seems to me that this is just stupid. I know exactly how to create subnets based on how many subnets I need. They should ask us to simply create those subnets instead of trying to trip us on those super unclear and annoying choices.

That is a poorly worded question IMO.

I have not taken the test so I'm not breaking any NDA.

If I had to answer that question I'm assuming they are talking about the binary equivalent of the number of subnets you need. So if you need 20 subnets you would have 00010100 which means you count from right to left until you reach the last 1. (unless there is only a single 1) This means you need 5 bits from the host portion of the network address in order to create the required 20 subnets.

feng.lian

Hey, I just want to update you all with my situation. I just passed the ICND1 exam with a score of 889 today. I haven't been looking at the forum for 2 days because I wanted to take a day off from studying. Thanks for all the help. I'm going to jump right into ICND2 after 2 rest days.

Edit: I actually found the real exam easier than the boson simulation. I was quite terrified of not finishing on time though. I did finish with 5 mins left, but I probably would have finished with 10 or 15 mins left if I kept the pace I was going in the middle of the exam when I thought I wasn't gonna make it. If I knew, I would have spent a little more time with the simulation problems.

bermovick

Good job! ICND2 is some fun stuff; the material is quite a bit harder (I found), but study pretty much the same as you did with ICND1. Take the boson exams when you feel you're ready, and if you can score mid-800's you're probably pretty good.

I found the ICND2 exam easier than ICND1, although I may have just gotten lucky with the questions I pulled. I scored lower (890 vs 920), but I had to skip a sim I couldn't figure out. It still bugs me!

HardDisk

Great job on passing the ICND1 exam.

I too have been using the Boson questions that came with the Odom book. Compared to a few other test simulators I have also be using (PrepLogic

and CramMaster) the Boson/Odom questions are the best.

So I was wondering how the actual Boson questions would compare to the Boson/Odom questions? Anybody?

mikej412

feng.lian wrote: »

passed the ICND1 exam

Congratulations!!

Good Luck with your ICND2 studies